Wireless mesh networks have recently become popular. In particular, wireless mesh networks that operate under one of the IEEE 802.11 wireless local area network (WLAN) standards have recently become popular. An example wireless mesh network includes wireless access points (APs) used outdoors to connect to client stations. The access points also each act as mesh points of a wireless mesh network, e.g., using an additional radio transceiver for the mesh backbone connection to route traffic between the mesh points, called mesh APs. Such mesh access points may be used, for example, to cover large metropolitan areas.
Recently, there has been a move in wireless networks away from autonomous access points towards what are called “light-weight” access points that are centrally controlled by, and work together with an entity in the wired network called a “WLAN controller” (WLC), or simply a controller. The AP functionality of the access point is managed by messages between the WLAN controller and the AP using a protocol called the Lightweight AP Protocol (LWAPP). There is an effort to standardize LWAPP in IETF as Control And Provisioning of Wireless Access Points (capwap). See for example www.capwap.org.
In addition to LWAPP, present-day lightweight mesh APs follow a multi-step process to form a tree topology for a wireless backhaul between mesh points, with one mesh point forming the root of the mesh tree topology. Each mesh point attempts to select a parent that provides a suitable path to the root of the tree topology. Once the tree topology is built, the parent as well as neighbors—potential parents—are then maintained on a periodic basis. One such well-known tree-building method is called Adaptive Wireless Path Protocol (AWPP). Tree forming, e.g., using AWPP, adds routing overhead to the network and also has some security implications.